


Black-Eyed

by Mertiya



Series: Falling Rings [1]
Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Dark, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Stockholm Syndrome, Therapy, Unhealthy Relationships, i think it's a bit less sad if you read it as an au, i was all set to label this an au, i'm not sure if it's an au actually?, in both directions really, kind of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-07
Updated: 2020-08-07
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:54:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25769248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mertiya/pseuds/Mertiya
Summary: Mairon does not torture Maeglin.
Relationships: Maeglin | Lómion/Sauron | Mairon
Series: Falling Rings [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1899013
Comments: 13
Kudos: 61





	Black-Eyed

**Author's Note:**

> With special thanks to bettashark, without whose excellent conversation this fic would not have happened!

The Elf’s black eyes are what Mairon notices first. Defiant, as are all Elves brought before the Lieutenant of Angband for the first time. But they are black, and they are angry, and Mairon does not think all the anger in that gaze is directed at him. He tips the Elf’s chin up and looks at him. “Your name?”

Startlement crosses the Elf’s face, as if he cannot understand this simple courtesy; it is followed by a sudden, sharp pain, and then he stammers out, “M-Maeglin,” before wrenching his chin away. But Mairon knows the pain of naming oneself falsely, and he is thoughtful when he leaves the Elf behind. He gives instructions to feed him well and not to torment him. 

He endures, as he always does, the sharp criticism of his master over—whatever has gone wrong this time. Usually, he tries to be attentive, but today he is tired and haunted by those black Elven eyes. He takes a whipping for it, but even the punishment does little to settle or concentrate his mind.

He returns before he means to and finds the Elf curled on his side in his cell. He sits up when Mairon enters and closes the door behind him. “What do you want?” he asks, his voice shaking. “I won’t tell you anything.”

He is young, this Elf, Mairon thinks. And he has been hurt before; the way he is already flinching and pulling himself into a defensive posture tells Mairon that. He stands in the center of the cell and looks down at his captive. “Is your name really Maeglin?” he asks softly.

Those dark eyes blink, pain flaring so fast that even Mairon is surprised at how well his first barb has landed.

“It is the name my father gave me,” Maeglin flashes back.

Mairon kneels now, something tugging at him in a way it has not in a great many centuries. “The name your father gave you?” he presses. “Did your mother disagree?”

Those black eyes go _wide_ , and he flinches as if Mairon had struck him.

“My parents are both dead,” Maeglin responds after a moment. “It does not matter. If you are going to torture me, I wish you would do so. I told you that I won’t tell you anything.”

“Perhaps not,” Mairon lies. “After all, you have been hurt before. Did you tell them anything then?”

“How do you—” He cuts himself off and looks away. “They did not want to know anything,” he says in a small voice. Then, “I was not worth it,” soft, almost inaudible, as if he is speaking to himself—and it is that, more than anything, that cracks something inside Mairon. He has _done_ this to people—to Men and Elves and Dwarves—and yet it cracks him open that someone _else_ has done it, too. Mairon is Gorthaur, is cruel, is wicked, is intended to hurt and break and pull apart—so has he molded himself into a sharp thing to please his master. 

“Not worth it to who?” he asks, and he thinks that Maeglin hears some kindness in his voice, and Mairon himself is not sure that it is feigned.

“My father,” Maeglin says wearily, tipping his head back against the cold wall of the dungeon, and Mairon thinks of _AulëManwëIlúvatar(notMelkorneverMelkor)_ and suddenly he is backing hastily out of the cell, fleeing from the Elf’s pain that he did not inflict.

He tells himself that he will not return, but he _does_ return, and it is only a day later that he does so. They talk of nothings. Mairon tells himself that he is preparing an unusual and most important prisoner. Then he tells Melkor so. He thinks that Melkor believes it, which he should, because it is the truth.

Maeglin is clever, for an Elf. He does not say anything that would tell Mairon the location of Gondolin, but he tells him everything else, and the more he speaks, the easier it is to tease out more. His dark hands twist and pull at a length of copper wire, and Mairon knows an artificer’s hands when he sees them.

He speaks of a lonely childhood, and a father who hurt him. An escape that ended in the death of his loving mother and the execution of his father. “I _wanted_ him to die,” Maeglin says, his voice soft, curious, and vicious. 

“And no wonder.” Mairon does not mean to pull him close and pet his hair, but he does. “Pain can be a gift, but only when it is sought and freely given,” he whispers.

Maeglin laughs in broken shards, but he does not pull away. “They would have called me evil for wishing for my father’s death, I know they would have,” he says. “They had me watch and then I heard them whispering about me. Everyone whispers about me. I look wrong, I am wrong, I cannot do anything quite right.” He gives Mairon a sudden, frightened gaze. “Have you drugged me?” he demands. “Have you drugged me that I should speak of these things?” His voice is high and tense.

Mairon smiles back and shows his teeth. “I am a monster, and there is nothing I would not do for my lord,” he says with a laugh. “But I have not drugged you, for I did not wish to, and I did not need to.”

Maeglin’s eyes go wide and fearful and now he pulls away. Mairon laughs himself all the way to the exit.

“I must know the location of Gondolin,” he tells Maeglin the following day.

“I will not tell you,” Maeglin says, but his voice sounds hopeless.

“You will.” Mairon kneels beside him. “Little Elf, everyone breaks. If I torture you, you will break, and you will tell me. And when you do...tell me, truly, is there anyone who will believe you did not do so out of your own free will?”

Those black eyes turn on him with a kind of horror, and then Maeglin begins to laugh again, those broken shards spewing from his throat, even as tears fall from his eyes. Mairon knows he should not, but he pulls him close, and Maeglin does not pull away. “I would care for you,” Mairon whispers, sudden, fierce. “I do not want to harm you. You have been harmed quite enough already and by those who should not.”

“So you—who _should_ harm me—will not?” Maeglin sobs. “You have just said you will harm me.” He sags. “And none of it will matter.”

One small Elf. One small hurt, bruised soul that should mean less than nothing to Mairon. It is just—there is an echo in his voice of a twisted pain beating at Mairon’s own heart. He sighs and brushes Maeglin’s hair back from his face. “All right,” he says ruefully. “It is only fair to invert the fate that you have suffered, so I will _not_ harm you. I will let you go.” It would have made a good lie, those words, but he is not lying. Stupid, but he will find another way into Gondolin, and his master would punish him for something else all the same. 

Maeglin stares at him with wide eyes as Mairon stands and walks to the door of the cell, ordering the guards away in a low voice. He opens the door himself—and stands aside.

The Elf rises to his feet and hurries to the door; he looks to the left and to the right down the empty corridors. He looks back at Mairon. Then those black eyes flash with sudden fury, and he traces back his steps and fists both hands in the front of Mairon’s shirt. “My mother named me Lómion,” he says, and then his hands slide up to grab and twist in Mairon’s hair and pull his head down into a biting, bloody kiss.

Mairon pulls him close, this fierce little Elf, despised and abandoned and hurt, and they are, both of them, laughing as they moan. For Mairon will protect him, and the Elf will leave behind those who never cared, never wanted him, were always suspicious of those black, black eyes.

And Gondolin will burn.


End file.
